In The Eyes Of A Stranger
by Itty Bitty Albatross
Summary: Three points in Dean and Cas's relationship, seen by different people. Destiel, can be read as romantic or strong platonic.


There've been six people who've read between the lines and seen something before anyone else. There've been three different days, different times, when someone saw a flicker of something and deduced what they were seeing. Five of them were a little early, actually, and maybe someone should look into those prophetic moments. Then again, they weren't far off, weren't seeing anything too implausible and it was only a matter of time until one of them floundered and came up right.

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**2 People Walking. **

Their names were Juan and Maria, and they were in love. It was at the Gulf of Mexico, they'd come to stay at a hotel and look at the trees and the history.

Dean and Cas were down there investigating a series of disappearances and an old painting of a watery, blurry figure that had real power off the canvas, avoiding each other's eyes, because Dean had been cruel and Cas had been angry.

They were at two different tables, the couple and the not-a-couple, at the same diner in the same time. While Maria pulled out a couple of tourists brochures, Dean yanked out a map and smoothed it out. He set it on the table and slid it towards Cas, trying very hard not to fling it at him.

And you know what? He wasn't even mad at Castiel. He was mad at his brother, and himself, and okay, maybe a little at Cas, but not for anything he could help. So when Dean said 'disappearances' and 'hunt', and Sam said in no uncertain terms 'no', Cas said 'yes', and Dean stuck his foot so far in his mouth he was pretty sure he'd taken out his own tonsils.

"You need to stay here, where'll you'll be safer." Which was annoying, but not as sharp and painful as, "then you won't endanger me, either."

Castiel, prior angel of the Lord, powerful, unstoppable force who waged war on the forces of evil, he was being told that he was useless, worse than useless, in fact. He was a liability.

Dean knew he'd been a son of a bitch, knew he'd hurt Cas. But Cas responded in kind, with a mention of how he wasn't safe at home, either, hadn't Dean seen that with all the people who'd died because he hadn't been around? Because he'd left?

Back at the café that smelled like fish, Cas slid the paper towards his cup of coffee. He stared at the map pointedly, frustrated at himself for not knowing what he was seeing, and mad at Dean Winchester for pointing out that he was useless.

Dean gulped down a half-a cup of coffee in one go, wishing he could order something stronger, hard-edged and bitter, to drown out the guilt pounding against him, but he knew he was _right_.

"Lover's quarrel." Maria mouthed to her Juan, seeing the posture and tension seeping into the floor beneath the other two men. Juan looked over at Dean drinking, at Dean drinking from Cas's coffee cup without knowing it, and nodded.

Juan had been there. Whatever was said, it would blow over; he knew because Dean ordered for Cas while the other man was gazing blankly at the map, and Cas finished his coffee and then Dean's, never mentioning the fact that someone else had drank his.

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**3 Police Officers. **

They were lucky—really, _really_, lucky—that the small-town sheriff didn't recognize them from any television program. He was a young guy, new to the job, and his two officers weren't seasoned either.

All they had on Dean Landry (I.D. courtesy Dean's credit card, thank you very much) and Cas was a breaking-and-entering charge, anyway, Officer Berkley mused. The three were standing behind the one-way mirror and going over what little they had, because there were no records for a Dean Landry anywhere and Cas had never specified a last name, just 'Cas', but Sheriff Ray typed it in as Cas Landry, seeing the two of them and the way they held themselves in regard to the other, like a couple of regular partners-in-crime or just plain old partners-in-life.

They were separate, in different rooms, at different tables, but their stories were identical and painted the two as honest, upright citizens. Unless one of them was going fold, to spill the beans, they had nothing to hold them to.

If you asked any of the three officers in the room, they wouldn't get that betrayal, they weren't going to get these two nailed down on anything substantial.

The first clue? That was the first words out of the dark-haired man, when Officer Berkley walked in the room. Cas was shirtless, having wrapped his shirt around Dean's bleeding arm, and he was propping up his own foot on the table in front of him, trying in vain to elevate it and stop the swelling, the pressure building in the joint and the purpling color of stretched tendons. He'd been running, then been sitting, for hours now, skin paling and vision blurring. He could've asked for an ice pack, or a drink of water, or a lawyer, but he didn't.

"Dean. How's Dean?" His blue eyes squinted in concern, scratching absently at the blood—Dean's blood—on his hands, and Berkley mentally adjusted his mental file of where these two men stood with each other. He glanced up at his reflection in the mirror and the co-worker he knew stood behind, knowing right now that they could interrogate away but wouldn't get anything to add to their file.

On the other side of the glass and the room in-between, Officer Ray shot the same look at the exasperated Officer Paul in the recording room. Dean 'Landry' had been fixed up, courtesy of his right to some medical attention, but hadn't let the bloodstained and torn up shirt get thrown away. He was twisting in his hands as he answered questions, like a reminder of whom the shirt belonged to, and who he was not going to squeal on.

It was hours later that Officer Paul declared they had nothing to go on. Cas and Dean were turned out again with a stern warning of 'watch your backs' and 'no more funny business', and the two shared amused looks as they walked away. It was like this was normal for them, being interrogated in the police station, and maybe it was. Maybe the two of them normally broke into houses and stole nothing, did nothing but burn up antique chairs that'd never done them any harm. Maybe they weren't on record because they always knew each other's stories, and never turned the other in.

They weren't wrong in that assumption. They were wrong in their idea of 'why'. At that point, it wasn't a matter of these two knowing each other's bodies or minds as well as officer's thought they did, only their souls.

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**1 Little Girl.**

It's odd that the littlest, the least world-weary of them, was the one who guessed right.

Her name was Alice, she was six, and that was how she introduced herself. Dean was the one to get down on his knees and ask her about the little people in the trees, and Cas was the one to look at Dean like he was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen, for kneeling next to a little girl and asking about what she'd seen. Alice got scared, thinking about it, because they may have been pretending but her daddy was an actor, and when they said 'it's not real' she knew they were lying. She started to breathe a little too heavy, too fast, and Dean looked up at Cas like he was saying 'help?', and Cas joined the two of them on the floor. Cas started to tell a story about another little girl, and it was a funny story, because apparently Cas knew how to smooth and sooth a troubled heart. When Cas said "The End.", Dean looked at him like he'd never heard a story before, and Alice figured somewhere in her mind that Dean always kept Cas around, so that he always had someone to tell a story when he got spooked.

Alice was right.


End file.
